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WildBill wrote:

lrb111 wrote:You might try faster bullets. CCI Stingers com to mind. fwiw, 1"at 100' is pretty common.

Faster bullets means higher velocity. Higher velocity doesn't mean high accuracy. As I recall, .22LR match ammo is slower than most.

Liko81 wrote:Short answer: Your average .22 plinker with $15-a-brick ammo can reliably tag a squirrel or rabbit at up to about 125 yards from benchrest if you know what you're doing. Translated to punching paper, that's a grouping of about 1 minute of arc (MOA), or about 2 inches at 100 yards, about 3 at 150.

Long answer: Depends on the setup you're using. With a good scope, properly mounted, decent ammo (I like Remington GBs as cheap and pretty reliable; there are FAR better match-grade offerings but they can be more expensive than hunting rifle rounds), a benchrest and a little practice, I would not be surprised if you could shoot a .5-MOA group at 100 yards from the same rifle. That's good enough for a varmint headshot out to about 200yd; however a standard .22 fired from a rifle is transsonic (it starts supersonic but slows to subsonic) which affects accuracy at that range. The maximum effective range of a standard-velocity .22 tops out at around 175 yards; beyond that it doesn't have sufficient oomph for a clean kill. You can find hyper-velocity .22 rounds (e.g. Hornets) that will stay supersonic longer, take more energy further, and thus avoid both problems; however they do not work with all rifles (the bullet's nose is often longer, which can jam some makes). You can also buy subsonic rounds that solve the problem the opposite way (most match-grade is subsonic); the disadvantages with subsonic when hunting are that range makes a bigger difference as the bullet's fall will be sharper at distance, and that your varmint will hear the shot before the bullet gets there. They are, of course, less lethal at range even though they're more accurate.